This is another in my series of posts on low-carb diets. I've been reducing the amount and changing the type of carbohydrate I eat, which by default changes the amount of fat and protein I eat. I'm wondering what the long-term effect of this pattern of eating is.________

I can't get over how low my blood sugars have been!

Here's my story in a nut shell...

Last summer, on a fluke, I tested my postprandial (after-eating) blood glucose (BG). It was around 140 mg/dl. I had only had some melon about 2 hours previously. I thought the reading was high. I tested it subsequently, and found both my fasting BG in the morning, and a number of after-meal tests were high ... in the range of Impaired Fasting Glucose (IFG) and Impaired Glucose Tolerance (IGT).

An almond is a seed.

So are Brazil nuts, cashews, walnuts, pecans, pistachios, and pine nuts.

Wheat berries, corn kernels, oat groats, rice, barley, quinoa, buckwheat, and amaranth are also seeds. Sesame, pumpkin, sunflower, flax, poppy, fenugreek ... seeds. Lentils are seeds. Peanuts are seeds. Beans ... kidney, pinto, soy, mung, adzuki ... more seeds. Fresh peas and green beans are seeds.

Seeds sprout. So I thought I'd soak some almonds in water. Yes, indeedy, they sprouted.

The sentence above is haunting me.

Doug asked:"I still don't understand why more care isn't necessary to avoid deficiencies of the essential amino acids. Is it the case that these amino acids are present in all fruits and vegetables? (I didn't think this was so, but you mentioned on that other thread that thinking has changed in this regard.) Or is it simply that easy to avoid a deficiency of an essential amino acid by consuming any mixture of fruits and vegetables?"Doug, I would answer "Yes." to your last question. I thought it summed up the facts well.

Plants are capable of manufacturing all 20 amino acids, which include the essential amino acids (EAAs), although amounts vary. I checked a number of foods (potatoes, broccoli, tomatoes, asparagus, corn, rice, oatmeal, beans, and others) and found all EAAs in each of these foods. Even an apple which is listed as having 0 grams of protein has all the EAAs, albeit it small amounts.

Would it were that cancer in the real world could be so readily switched off.

Here's another study. On rats. After administering a carcinogen (aflatoxin), researchers fed rats a high-protein diet. The rats' cancer grew. Researchers switched to a low-protein diet, the rat's cancer regressed. Researchers switched back to the high-protein diet. The rats' cancer came back, with a vengeance.

I've been meaning to post this for months and now is a good time, given my previous post about deaths linked to an intensive diabetes drug regimen. This study shows that diet, and diet alone, can affect a change in glycemic measures, e.g. HbA1c, that rivals what can be had with drug therapy.

It's one of the studies Melinda mentioned in comments. I like it because it's a diet study, not a nutrient study. Diet studies are harder to conduct than nutrient interventions. But to me they're more real. They're about foods and what people eat, and how that day-to-day behavior can affect health.

Ronald's comment reminded me of this.

Libby's Ingredients: Mechanically Separated Chicken, Partially Defatted Cooked Pork Fatty Tissue, Beef Tripe, Partially Defatted Cook Beef Fatty Tissue, Vinegar, Salt, Spices, Sugar, Flavorings, Sodium Erythorbate And Sodium Nitrate.

Paul Krzyzanowski posted this photo of his collection:

I hope everyone had a nice Holiday!

Mine was made that much nicer by the presence of a roasted duck on Christmas Day. (I have to thank Migrainer for her advice to prick the skin thoroughly and often as it roasts. Thank you, Migrainer.) This duck rendered like nothing I've ever seen. It had enough fat pad to fly across the Arctic (Oops! New Years' Resolution #3: No more hyperbole.) ... enough fat pad to fly across a few pretty, snow-covered, Pennsylvania pastures.

I was digging through the FAO's data files and saw some numbers I thought would look better on a chart than in a few columns on Excel.

Click for larger.
There are 172 countries included in this graph. I couldn't fit all their names on the x-axis but you can go to the Excel file to see the intake for a particular country. Protein intake ranges from 25 grams/person/day in the Democratic Republic of Congo to 136 g/p/d in Israel. (Israel?) The US consumed an average of 133 g/p/d. Intakes are for the years 2002-2004.

You can find the raw data at:
Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, Food Security Statistics (Under Food Consumption / Nutrients).
________Chart and image of chart: Homegrown.

Something is pushing my blood sugars down and I think it's short chain fatty acids (SCFAs), at least in part.

Short chain fatty acids (SCFAs) are produced in the large intestine by the action (fermentation) of bacteria on undigested carbohydrates. SCFAs are absorbed through the colon wall. Those little fatty acids are in fact responsible for providing us with a few more calories from the food we eat. Just a few. Maybe accounting for about 10% of our total caloric intake 1, 2

What Type of Carbohydrates Produce SCFAs?

And ...

• Fish raises insulin more than popcorn.
• Cheese raises insulin more than white pasta.

This is not news. These findings appeared 11 years ago:

An Insulin Index Of Foods: The Insulin Demand Generated By 1000-kj Portions Of Common Foods, American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 1997

Among the foods tested, breakfast cereals as a group (Cornflakes, Special K, Honeysmacks, Sustain, All-Bran, muesli, oatmeal porridge) produced a lower insulin score* than protein-rich foods as a group (beef, white fish, cheese, eggs, lentils, baked beans). Foods of equal caloric content were compared.

* Insulin score was calculated as the area under the 120-minute insulin response curve for 1000 kJ of test food, relative to a reference food (white bread). (1000 kJ is about 240 calories.)

A strong insulin response is not always desirable.

Darn it. I wish the picture of this recipe had turned out better, but the dish smelled so good and I was too impatient to dive in. I know - bad food blogger. If you think it's odd to make Pasta with Pumpkin and Sausage anytime after Thanksgiving, you'd be wrong! This pasta is so unique and interesting that it should me made at any time of year.

I wondered how much of the weight I lost when I reduced my carbohydrate intake this summer was a result of water loss. You may recall I was losing a pound a day without changing my caloric intake. I suspect that rate would have slowed.1 Still, I wasn't happy with the goings-on in the mirror. So I ate an apple. Then 2 tablespoons of brown rice. And an entire 1.5 oz (31 g of carbs!) box of Sunmaid raisins. OK, 2 boxes. I was on a roll, not literally.

Finally, someone recommended a Rachael Ray recipe to me! My friend Jenny mentioned that she tried Chipotle-Glazed Chicken Breast and Grilled Chopped Veggie Salad from Rachael Ray's Get Real Meals and that she and her husband really enjoyed it. I loved the novelty of finally having someone recommend a recipe to me instead of me recommending a recipe, so I had to make it.

We are big fans of chipotle peppers in my house. If you've never tried them before, use this recipe as your excuse. They are smoked jalapenos and have some seriously great flavor.

My previous post showed how high-protein foods can raise post-meal insulin levels higher than high-complex-carbohydrate foods (Beef Raises Insulin More Than Oatmeal).

This post shows how higher-fat diets raise post-meal insulin (and glucose) levels higher than lower-fat, higher-carb diets.

I'm finding more and more evidence for the benefits of eating a lower-fat, lower-protein, higher-complex-carbohydrate diet. This is not what I expected ... having read the rational for, and experimented with, low-carb Atkins-like diets.

Here's the study:
Effects Of Isoenergetic High-Carbohydrate Compared With High-Fat Diets On Human Cholesterol Synthesis And Expression Of Key Regulatory Genes Of Cholesterol Metabolism, American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 2001

It was a small randomized crossover study that compared:

• High-fat diet (40% carbohydrate, 45% fat) (HF)

Given the heated interest in resistant starch (RS) these days, lab rats' diets have been getting pretty darn starchy. And by the looks of it, their colons are healthier for it.

It really is almost Spring. I hate to break it to you, but it's true. Winter sure seemed to fly by and I think some sunshine, flowers, and fuzzy bunnies are well needed, don't you? Well, if you want to hold on to that last little bit of winter, you could make a soup like this Butternut Squash Soup with Sweet and Spicy Pecans from the November 2007 issue of Every Day with Rachael Ray.

Mark Bittman, author of the popular How To Cook Everything , New York Times' food writer, and host of the YouTube video that accompanied my post New York Times' No Knead Bread (probably the most-visited post in my entire blog archive) has a new NYTs article out. From yesterday's paper:

Prior to the 1980s it was thought that most starch we ate was digested and absorbed, and that those processes occurred in the small intestine. Subsequent experiments showed that portions of some starches were resistant to hydrolysis (breakdown) by our digestive enzymes. The term resistant starch (RS) was coined to describe these starches.

Up to 75% of the starch in red kidney beans may be resistant to digestion.

I've been working my way backwards along the processing line in hopes of finding grains that won't spike my postprandial (after-meal) blood glucose. I found some, and I can say without doubt, at least when it comes to my constitution, all whole grains are not created equal.

On the left, my whole grain barley. On the right, my whole grain oats. The barley is hulled, that is, an outer fibrous hull has been removed but some bran is still intact. Pearl or pearled barley has the bran removed. The oats are also hulled, the outer husk has been removed but oat bran is still intact.

No More Kashi

In 2006, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations published a 400-page report detailing the impact of livestock on the environment:

Livestock's Long Shadow, FAO, 2006 (PDF)

It's been a real eye-opener for me:

Climate Change:"The livestock sector is a major player [in climate change], responsible for 18% of greenhouse gas emissions measured in CO2 equivalent. This is a higher share than transport."The major portion of those emissions comes from gases other than CO2, gases with a greater potential to warm the atmosphere, such as:

• Methane - from enteric fermentation by ruminants
• Nitrous oxide - from manure

Land Use:

Do visit a Calorie Counter.

It also counts protein, fat, carbohydrate, fiber, and lots of other nutrients the USDA has tucked away in their data base. Uncluttered, fast, informative - government agencies in charge of food could learn from a site like this. :)

The owner of the site also has a blog. His last entry on November 6th points to a spectacular table he just created that compares basic nutrition facts for some popular foods from over 20 fast food restaurants:

Fast Food Restaurants & Nutrition Facts Compared

It is Sunday evening and still no baby. We had a nice relaxing Sunday. We went to church and then had a wonderful two hour nap. I figure get them in while we can. We also gassed up the car and put it through the car wash, ready for whatever this week brings. I have a Doctors appointment tomorrow that my doula is taking me to.

The weather is great. It didn't get any higher than 65 today! So we opened up all of the windows and aired out the house. I picked up around the house and read some more of Obama's book, "Dreams From My Father", which is really good so far.

I got mad at a family in church today. There were two little boys who were acting out so their parents gave them crackers and cookies to placate them. Which they smashed into the pew cushion instead of eating. This wouldn't have bothered me except the whole family got up and left the smashed cookies and crackers on the pew! Grrrr.....

What to do with your left over eggs: Brought to you by Momlogic

If you blew out the whites:

Ohhhhh, I could live on a diet of fruit and nuts!!

Early Humans On The Menu

An excerpt:You wouldn't know it by current world events, but humans actually evolved to be peaceful, cooperative and social animals, not the predators modern mythology would have us believe, says an anthropologist at Washington University in St. Louis.

I sure am glad it's not my job to come up with the best eating plan for all Americans, let alone the world.1 (The World Health Organization has my sympathy.) The choices and defenders of those choices are numerous and polarized.

Regarding carbohydrates, it may be that a low-carbohydrate diet, around 10% of calories, is the best eating plan for overall health for everyone. Alternatively, it may be that a high-carbohydrate diet, above 45% of calories, is. Research has not sufficiently compared and contrasted the two.

Recall my post from a few weeks ago, Living High Off The Hog?, where livestock farmers in Pennsylvania ..."... started giving their pigs and cows chocolate - and banana chips and cashews and yogurt-covered raisins, any of which were cheaper than run-of the-mill corn and beans. One farmer even supplied his cattle a special "party mix" of popcorn, pretzels, cheese curls and crisps. This, he told reporters, saved 10% on feed costs."It looks like livestock farmers in Europe may add animal remains to their party mix: 1
"The European Union is preparing plans to allow pig remains to be used to feed poultry. The practice - banned in Europe after the BSE* crisis 10 years ago - would save farmers millions of pounds as prices of cereal feed for chickens soar, say officials in Brussels."

I've been eating a lower carbohydrate diet. By default this has me eating more meat. The recent issues of breast cancer in my family have had me investigating meat consumption's affect on cancer risk.

I found this study while browsing the research:

Red Meat Intake and Risk of Breast Cancer Among Premenopausal Women (November, 2006)

Study Basics

• Study population: 90,659 premenopausal women from the famous Nurses Health Study II

For the last several weeks, I've been posting about working my way through the top 10 recipes from Rachael Ray's talk show last season. Let me tell you, I think I found a recipe that could dethrone the Buffalo Chicken Chili from the top spot: Salmon en Croute. Now, making this recipe was all about synchronicity. My friend Tommy had just gone fishing in Alaska and had more wild salmon that he knew what to do with and I needed wild salmon after worrying that farmed can have lots of toxic stuff.